Hands Up for Trad’s Women in Music and Culture 2024 list has been announced to celebrate just some of the women working in Scotland.
Launched as part of International Women’s Day 2023, we shine the spotlight on 15 women who all contribute towards Scotland’s cultural landscape through their work. Read the 2024 list here.
We asked Victoria McNulty to tell us more about there work, influences and ambitions for the future.
How did you first get involved in the arts and who were your early influences?
I first got involved in writing and performing poetry around 10 years ago. I’d had a few ups and downs, and my wee boy was young so I welcomed having a creative outlet and something of my own. It was a really positive time in my life, actually. I was a single mum and it was a way of meeting new people and hearing new ideas. It helped me come out of my shell.
I loved poetry at school, particularly Seamus Heaney and William Blake. When I was at uni I studied a lot of Medieval Welsh poetry (which is very niche and a bit random now) and I loved reading Máirtín Ó Direáin and Sorley MacLean in translation. But life took over and I stopped thinking about this things. When I started to write again I was really influenced by modern music – the Stone Roses, The Pogues, the Clash, the Streets all said more about my life and what I understood. I suppose I tried to meld both.
At a time which has been very challenging for many people working in the arts, how did you use the last 3 years to develop your creativity?
If I’m honest I have been quite ill the past while with Long COVID so I have really had to evaluate my life in general and the creative work that I do. I can’t perform as readily as I used to and my memory is completely shot. Also the climate for performance, political and class based writing like mine, has completely changed since Lockdown so I’m still testing the water I suppose.
I had to find my voice again and I am still am doing that. I used the time to connect with people who inspire me, and craft my writing in a different way again. I worked a lot in communities and it helped me see all the different ways people can express themselves. I’ve been really lucky also to have a lot of time to research what interests me and travel around the West Coast of Scotland and to Ireland. It’s helped me piece the jigsaws together, It’s a work in progress but I’m excited to be writing in a new light.
Who or what interests you creatively?
I am a history geek and I think my writing is always routed in history in some ways. I really love industrial and Socialist history and just stories about ordinary people’s lives. I’m not really interested in glamour or royalty or anything like that. I want to know about people who worked down pits or I dunno went to Northern Soul nights in Wigan or something.
I’m also really inspired by language. I often write and perform in Scots and have been a Gaelic and Irish learner for many years. I know I will never be fluent but each new word or structure I learn shows me an alternative understanding. I’m always thinking about poems as a puzzle and it probably comes from that.
I love Britpop and a bit of 90s nostalgia but also have a real love of trash watching Danny Dyer programmes – so aye football culture, punk, Adidas trainers, big industrial cities. All of it.
What are your plans for the next year or so and/or what are your longer term creative ambitions?
Really to write more, and to perform where I can. I have been working on a collection for a long time but it’s still very much up in the air just now.
I really want to reconnect with my local poetry scene after being out of it for so long. See what’s new, who’s good and just enjoy words for a while.
I suppose my longer term plan is to bring some of that work together and perhaps bring it in a collection. Maybe even have it published!
Find out more about Victoria McNulty here.
Read the Hands Up for Trad’s Women in Music and Culture 2023 List
Hands Up for Trad are an organisation who work with Scottish traditional music, language and culture. If you would like to support our work you can donate here.
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